Turning the Country Around and Restoring Fiscal Responsibility

Turning the Country Around and Restoring Fiscal Responsibility

David Walker served as United States Comptroller General from 1998 to 2008, and he is now the President and CEO of The Peter G. Peterson Foundation.

Walker served as Comptroller General of the United States and head of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) from 1998 to 2008. Appointed by President Bill Clinton, his tenure as the federal government's chief auditor spanned both Democratic and Republican administrations. While at the GAO, Walker embarked on a Fiscal Wake-up Tour, partnering with the Brookings Institution, the Concord Coalition, and the Heritage Foundation to alert Americans to wasteful government spending. Walker left the GAO to head the Peterson Foundation on March 12, 2008. Labor-management relations became fractious during the 9-year tenure of the 7th Comptroller General, David M. Walker. On September 19, 2007, GAO analysts voted by a margin of two to one, in a 75% turnout, to establish the first union in GAO's 86-year history.

In 2008, Walker was personally recruited by Peter G. Peterson, co-founder of the Blackstone Group, and former Secretary of Commerce under Richard Nixon, to lead his new foundation. The Foundation distributed the documentary film, I.O.U.S.A., which follows Walker and Robert Bixby, director of the Concord Coalition, around the nation, as they engage Americans in town-hall style meetings, along with luminaries such as Warren Buffett, Alan Greenspan, Paul Volker and Robert Rubin.

After serving for 10 years as comptroller general and head of the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), David Walker resigned in 2008 to become president and CEO of the Peter G. Peterson Foundation where he leads efforts to promote fiscal responsibility in the federal government. Since his resignation, Walker has been one of the leading voices against the mounting federal debt. With the federal government debt over 60 trillion dollars, Walker presents ways for the country to rein in out-of-control spending and reform Social Security, health care, defense, tax, political and other systems. His efforts are chronicled in the hit documentary “I.O.U.S.A.,” and his new book “Comeback America” is due out in January.